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A Connecticut mother and daughter who climbed over a bike rack to get into the US Capitol on January 6 have pleaded guilty

Screenshot from open-source video that shows Lavin and Krzywicki climbing a bike rack outside the Capitol.
Screenshot from open-source video that shows Lavin and Krzywicki climbing a bike rack outside the Capitol.

  • A mother and daughter who stormed the Capitol together pleaded guilty to one charge each.
  • Jean Lavin and Carla Krzywicki were captured on video climbing over a bike rack to enter the Capitol.
  • The duo was arrested after a tipster told the FBI Krzywicki posted photos to Facebook.

A mother and daughter duo who stormed the Capitol together on January 6, 2021, both pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor charge of parading, demonstrating, or picketing in a Capitol building earlier this week. 

Jean Lavin, 57, and Carla Krzywicki, 20, of Canterbury, Connecticut, were arrested in September after an anonymous tipster told the FBI that Krzywicki had posted photos of herself and her mother outside the Capitol and pictures from inside the building on January 6, according to charging documents. 

The two women initially faced four charges, including entering a restricted building, and disorderly and disruptive conduct in a Capitol building. But as the government works to prosecute the more than 730 people arrested in connection to the attack, federal prosecutors have offered several Capitol rioters the lesser parading charge in exchange for their guilty pleas. 

The count carries a possible sentence of up to six months in prison, but other rioters who have pleaded guilty to the misdemeanor have received sentences ranging from probation to 45 days in jail.

Screenshot of a Facebook post made by Carla Krzywicki after the Capitol riot, including a photo of the two of them together outside the Capitol.
Screenshot of a Facebook post made by Carla Krzywicki after the Capitol riot.

During a June interview, Lavin told investigators she and her daughter took the bus from Connecticut to DC to attend former President Donald Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally, but the bus driver got lost, and the duo ended up missing his speech. She said she and Krzywicki followed the crowd and entered the Capitol “to look around out of curiosity” and stayed inside the building for less than an hour.

Krzywicki told investigators she posted photos from the scene but later removed them because it seemed “like a bad idea” to keep them up. 

Prosecutors said that the mother-daughter duo was caught on camera climbing over a bicycle rack that other rioters had repurposed from a police barricade into an entry point into the Capitol building amid the siege.

In court on Tuesday, Lavin addressed their motivations during the riot. 

“We went along with the crowd but didn’t have the mob mentality like others there,” Lavin said according to The Associated Press.

Attorneys for Lavin and Krzywicki did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment. 

Both women will pay $500 each in restitution to the Architect of the Capitol to help cover the nearly $1.5 million in damage done by rioters that day. The two are to be sentenced on April 22. 

Read the original article on Business Insider

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